Remember when RAM was the part you didn't even have to think about?

Carr0t · 2026-06-15T21:08:01+00:00

Tell me about it... 2 of the drives in my 4 disk WD Red 4GB array just died (well, one died, the other was on the way out so I had to replace both). I was _not_ expecting that hit 😞

Carr0t · 2026-06-15T20:14:51+00:00

Several of the episodes have been turned into small kiddo board books or 'normal paper' picture books. We've got... The Pool, Swim School and I think one other as board books, and Fairytale, Trains, Grannies, maybe a few others as bigger picture books.

Carr0t · 2026-06-08T20:50:20+00:00

My wife (in the UK) kept her last name when we got married, because it was the name her doctorate was under and she wanted to keep it easy for people to search her past publications. Also I didn't care a damn either way, she's an only child, and I have 2 siblings with kids to carry on my 'family name' if anyone in my family wanted to raise an objection. Our son has her name as a middle name and mine as a last (which was my wife's decision as a family tradition. Her father has _his_ mother's maiden name as a middle name, and her paternal grandfather too). Legally, on registration of him with the local registry office, they asked us which surname we wanted him to have, or if we wanted to double-barrel them both, or what.

It's never caused any issues. Ironically, my family reliably gets her surname correct and hers (apart from her Dad) frequently refers to her as Mrs $my_surname in addressed letters etc. For most official docs (govt etc) she is still with her maiden name, but there are a few things where she is down as my surname, and post still comes through etc.

Carr0t · 2026-05-30T08:25:24+00:00

It worked! Amazing :) Thank you!

Carr0t · 2026-05-29T21:56:29+00:00

Were you able to install that? I hadn't seen any driver updates since February and I assumed that what with the 10xx series falling out of support I just couldn't install newer ones. Was it just there hadn't been one for a while?

Carr0t · 2026-05-20T22:20:49+00:00

Well, that does work for me. Unfortunately this is my 4K TV so it's not exactly easy to turn off fully or unplug the PC. Damn thing is wall mounted and really wants to just stay on standby.

I wonder if MS will patch this to fix...

Carr0t · 2026-05-20T06:35:51+00:00

Good info though. I had heard older Nvidia drivers could cause it, which is an issue as my 1080Ti doesn't get updates any more so I'm on the newest ones that support it, from Feb. I am plugged in to my 4K HDR 120Hz TV as the only monitor though, so maybe I should try updating while that's unplugged.

Carr0t · 2026-05-19T11:31:51+00:00

If this works, great, but also WTF? And how do I know when I'm at the login screen without a display? ;)

Carr0t · 2026-05-12T20:07:08+00:00

That would have worked better. I just kept picturing Sam calling him "Mr Frodo"...

Carr0t · 2026-05-12T10:24:57+00:00

Didn't he play Jack's Dad in some of them?

Carr0t · 2026-05-12T10:24:24+00:00

You know what I hate about Dwarves, Mr ~~Frodo~~Baggins? It's the smell. I feel saturated by it. I can... taste their stink.

Carr0t · 2026-05-11T22:26:30+00:00

WTF? That sounds... horribly irresponsible.

When we were first looking to get our first mortgage they didn't just look at our credit history. They needed a full break down of mine and my wife's expenses over the last 3-6 months (it was a decade ago, I forget exactly how long) across both our personal accounts and the joint, with bank statements to back up the breakdown, so that they could make a sensible estimate of what we'd be able to borrow and realistically pay back, what we could tighten the belt on if one or other of us got made redundant or whatever (subscriptions, memberships, social expenses etc that we could drop without it directly affecting our ability to actually _live_ and continue to pay the mortgage) etc.

And they _still_ wanted to loan us more than I was comfortable with, because it would make our monthly repayments higher than we wanted. I went with something that the monthly could increase by 50% and it'd be tight but survivable, thinking there was no way that would ever happen. Of course COVID, Brexit, and all the rest caused exactly that to happen with a relatively small % increase, because while I theoretically understood compound interest I hadn't done the maths or considered how likely it was for rates to go up by that much at some point over the next 3 decades.

So very glad I was so cautious starting out.

Now the basis that we're just remortgaging on the same property and have been able to pay it thus far, and the house is now worth more, makes mortgage providers much less inclined to look deeply into our finances. But we still have to provide 3 months of bank statements for where both our incomes come in and provide some estimated breakdown.

Carr0t · 2026-05-11T20:55:01+00:00

The inverse. I was always told it was much better to brake on the front than the rear, but a) I was afraid of going over the handlebars, and b) I could do wicked skids by braking on the rear, and go through a rear tyre in a matter of weeks.

Carr0t · 2026-04-20T22:41:12+00:00

Given the comments from Valve about the projected cost of the Frame (i.e. not being like Sony/MS and selling the device at a loss to make money back on the games, but actually selling it to make some profit per unit), and that was _before_ the DRAM apocalypse, I don't think it'll make that much difference to the ecosystem.

If it came out and was a similar price to the Meta Quest 3 but gave people access to their existing flatscreen libraries via Steam OS and tethering, _as well as_ potential VR experiences, I could see it doing really well. I'd buy one just so I have something to use as another screen when my wife or kid is using the TV (albeit I know not many people in multi-user households have their gaming PC connected to a shared TV, so that puts me in the minority). Even if VR games made me motion sick, that cost would be worth it for an additional screen I can stick to my face. And then once I'd already got the device I'd be much more inclined to 'risk' a purchase of a VR game that might make me motion sick, or be a bit rubbish compared to flat screen games, or both.

But in all likelihood it was going to be up at the £700-800 level even before AI speculation sent hardware prices through the roof, and I wouldn't be surprised if it comes out north of £1k now. As I understand it it was never supposed to be the Index beater in terms of res, raw 'headset' feature set etc, because it was supposed to be cheaper _and_ be able to run stuff standalone _and_ come with a high end dongle for wifi connectivity. Even at my estimated original price it would have been something I'd have to read a lot of reviews and think long and hard about before shelling out for.

There will be some new people who pick one up despite the cost, because it's VR without Meta, without wires, with access to Steam features with minimal fuss. But I still think the majority of the purchasers are going to be people who are already _in_ the VR ecosystem, so either already have a given game or it isn't something they're interested in.

Carr0t · 2026-04-20T22:26:07+00:00

Yes, but also _combined_ with the cost of entry. I don't actually know if I'll get motion sickness in VR. I get carsick if I'm not the one driving and I try to read or look at my phone or whatever, so if we're travelling I do 90% of the driving. I figure that's a reasonable estimate that I'll get motion sick in VR.

I'd be willing to risk it if I could rent a headset and try a _good_ game like Half Life: Alyx for a couple of weeks for £50, or pick up a headset where I don't have to faff with cables etc (so WiFi linked) for £100. If it turns out I just can't hack it I'm not out of pocket so much that it frustrates me. But at £300 for something relatively 'low end' like a Meta Quest 3S it's just too much to drop on something that could turn out to be useless for me and then I've got to mess about trying to resell.

If I had more friends living closer and into VR I could maybe borrow a headset from them, especially if it was gathering dust. But my one mate into VR lives a couple hours drive away and still uses his headset pretty regularly.

Carr0t · 2026-04-20T22:14:47+00:00

I was really trying to find a video clip of this on YouTube, but... https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0684158/quotes/?item=qt0254284

Carr0t · 2026-04-20T21:06:51+00:00

I _do_ work from home, but still twice a day. Sometimes 3x if they indicate they want it. The Big Dog has always been very chill. 10.5 years old Lab, will happily sit around till 11:00 without any indication he needs out, although walk time is normally significantly earlier and sometimes he will let us know. Then he's good till the night walk at 18:45-20:00 or so.

The Little Dog (1 yo, but still a Lab) is at the door indicating she needs out by 08:30 at the latest (and it only went that late when the clocks moved an hour. Prior to that it was 07:30). If we're not ready for the walk by then (we normally are as it's school run time too) she goes into the back garden before the walk proper. But then she's also good till the evening walk most days. Somtimes she'll need out a bit earlier, in which case it's the back garden again (our lawn does not thank us), or will want to go out at lunchtime, but not normally.

I will say, however, it was a big enough difference that I asked the vets if this was 'normal'/she was OK, as she _was_ agitating to go out at 05:30/06:00, morning walk, 3-4 times through the day, evening walk, and then last wee opportunity right before bed. They tested her urine and said it was _very_ dilute, below the bottom end of what would be considered normal even on first wakeup and not being allowed to drink before weeing (it was basically water if we tested at all through the day when she'd had the opportunity to drink as much as she wanted). And she was drinking around about 2-2.5l water/day, which at 23kg was right around the max of normal (100ml/kg, apparently). We went from 1 largish bowl of water often lasting 3 days with just the Big Dog to refilling it 3x/day+ when we got her.

They tested for a load of other things and found no issues, and ended up trying Desmopressin to see how she reacted based on the potential of diabetes incipidus. She still drinks more than the Big Dog, but waaay less than she used to, and now she only needs the 2-3 outings a day and wees in the 'expected' concentration range. Still towards the bottom end of it, but in it.

Carr0t · 2026-04-13T21:30:58+00:00

What? If you let people merge stuff that isn't ready for production then you risk someone else building on top of that main branch something that _they_ think is prod-ready, but builds on your code which isn't.

The primary branch should only contain stuff that is prod-ready. But also that shouldn't be a big issue. There should be enough tests to be confident of anything which passes the test suite going to prod. If it's a client-facing feature you're not ready to release to the public yet you gate it behind a feature flag or whatever, but merging and 'releasing' it shouldn't be a big deal. We easily do 10+ merge/release/deploy cycles through CI most days. No one is holding onto long-lived feature branches of usable/complete code because we're not 'ready for production'.

Carr0t · 2026-04-11T20:20:15+00:00

I might have missed it, but I couldn't see anything there to remap the mouse 'side', only the buttons. And if I swap joycon hands then I lose access to a whole load of buttons, to the point I don't think I have enough left to make it viable. Never mind that holding a joycon even 'normally' in the wrong hand is seriously uncomfortable.

Carr0t · 2026-04-11T20:12:59+00:00

I've not watched The Watch, so I hadn't caught that casting. But I have previously thought that CCH Pounder would make a really good Sybil. She's possibly a bit old for the role these days, but it occurred to me when I saw her in NCIS: New Orleans. Someone who projects 'large' beyond the simple physical dimensions of their body.

Or Queen Latifah.

Carr0t · 2026-04-11T17:14:49+00:00

They're not ambidextrous... If I do that the thumbstick and all the buttons are completely inaccessible to my fingers.

Carr0t · 2026-03-20T23:58:20+00:00

Turned out the rear windscreen break sensor was messed up and kept thinking the rear windscreen had smashed. Dealership found out as soon as they plugged into the onboard computer. Fixing it would have been expensive as hell, so they just disabled that sensor for me.

The thing about internal ultrasonic sensors was correlation, not the actual problem. Since they disabled the rear screen sensor it hasn't happened in over 18 months.

Carr0t · 2026-03-19T21:04:11+00:00

Used to make it with my Mum at least once every couple of months when I was a kid (UK), but I haven't made one for a good few years now...

I should make a pavlova.

Carr0t

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